Automated fiber placement machines are widely used to manufacture parts, components and structures from composite material. The materials used in automated fiber placement are typically composed of longitudinal fibers and resin consolidated into tapes, or thin strips, commonly known as “tows.” Individual tapes or tows are manipulated by the fiber placement machine to form a band of material that is deposited onto a tool. Parts are built up layer-by-layer, with tapes or tows of composite material, with the angle at which each layer “ply” is laid onto the tool being precisely determined by the fiber placement machine.
Automated fiber placement enables the construction of complex composite structures having steered or curvilinear fiber paths. This method of producing composite structures is more cost effective than manual methods. It provides an improved structural efficiency due to its ability to orient the fibers along local internal loads paths, which potentially results in lighter structures and lower cost than in structures made by other production methods.
In order to provide maximum flexibility of use, it is desirable that a fiber placement head and a support structure for the fiber placement head be as compact as possible. This is particularly true, where it is desirable to fabricate structures having concave sections into which the fiber placement head must descend during fabrication of the part.
For maximum speed of fiber placement, it is desirable to be able to perform bi-directional fiber placement. To perform bi-directional fiber placement, it is necessary that the fiber placement head be capable of almost instantaneously cutting the tows at an edge of the part, and flipping around to an opposite orientation for laying tows in an opposite direction across the part.
It is also desirable that both the fiber placement head and support structure for the fiber placement head be a compact, rugged simple construction, and allow maximum access for threading the multiple tows of fiber through the support structure and placement head.